Draft’s Author-ity

This selection is interesting in its topic and the way that it is written. Sommers starts off talking a little bit about her childhood. She talked about one of the stories that her parent’s read her and about how she began to learn to speak German. She then switches topics and begins to talk about her daughter and her desire to learn Italian. It then changes pace and goes back a couple of years and she discusses some of the things that she pondered while teaching her writing class. She discusses both the changes made in between drafts and about authority, which at first glance appears to be completely unrelated. Her common thought is that authority should not be accepted without much scrutiny, as her shirt stated “Question Authority”. This is related to revising drafts because she is questioning the motive for the revision wondering if the revisions are just appeals to authority or if they truly reflect the reader’s thoughts. Between drafts a reader takes time to step back and think about what they have written, during this time they might reflect on what other may think of their work and that may lead to some revisions, this is what Sommers is talking about when she refers to authority in writing. She is criticizing people for letting other’s influence the way that their writing and works turn out. She refers back to the book that was read to her as a child which illustrates children who disobey authority suffering terrible punishments. Sommers believes that people appeal to authority in their revisions because they are afraid of punishment similar to the way she was afraid of punishment for the acts that were committed in her childhood book. She connects writer’s revisions to the way that they act in life. If the appeal to authority in their writings then as in life they will blindly obey and follow the authority set before them. 

~ by nycum on November 14, 2007.